Institution names are not translated
The name of a Turkish university, court or registry office is an identifier, and identifiers are kept. A translation keeps the original name and adds an explanation in brackets where one helps. Replacing it with an assumed Canadian equivalent makes the document impossible to verify.
Checked on 8 September 2026 Last updated 8 September 2026
In brief
- Certification level
- Certified translator (Québec)
- Estimated time
- Costs nothing to get right; expensive to correct after submission
- Destination country
- Québec
Accepted under conditions
A translated document has two kinds of content. There is text that has to be understood, and there is text whose job is to identify something. Names of institutions belong to the second kind, and the rule that follows is short: keep the name, explain it if necessary, never replace it.
The rule and its usual form
The original name is retained as it appears on the document, and where a reader would otherwise be lost, a translation or a short description follows in brackets. The reader learns what the institution is; the identifier survives intact. A translation that silently substitutes an English or French name has removed the only string by which anyone can look the institution up.
Why the identifier matters more than the meaning
Reviewing officers verify. They check a university against a recognised-institutions list, look up a court, confirm that a registry office exists in the district named on the record. Every one of those checks is a search for the actual name. Present them with a plausible-sounding rendering and the search returns nothing, which is a far worse outcome than an unfamiliar Turkish name they can copy and paste.
Assessment procedures are the sharpest example: recognition of a qualification usually starts with recognition of the institution that awarded it. The credential assessment page sets out how that stage works.
Where the temptation is strongest
- University names, especially where the Turkish name contains a person's name or a place name that seems translatable.
- Secondary schools with a type designation in the title, which describes the school category rather than naming it.
- Courts and public prosecutors' offices, where an approximate Canadian equivalent is easy to reach for and rarely accurate.
- Ministries and their provincial directorates, whose official names change over time.
- Companies, where the legal form is part of the registered name.
Faculties, departments and degree titles are handled differently
These are descriptive rather than identifying, and a translation is expected: the field of study has to be intelligible to whoever reads the file. What is still not permitted is converting a degree title into its assumed Canadian counterpart, since that asserts an equivalence the translator has no authority to assert. The usual approach is a faithful rendering of the Turkish title, with the original alongside it, leaving the equivalence question to the body that decides it. The same reasoning governs the rule on grades.
Renamed, merged and closed institutions
Turkish higher education has seen universities founded, renamed and reorganised, and faculties transferred between them. Your diploma shows the name in force on the day it was issued, which may no longer exist. The document is not wrong and should not be updated: the translation keeps the historical name, and if it helps, a bracketed note records that the institution now operates under a different name. Where the change is material, ask the university for a letter confirming the succession, and submit that alongside rather than editing the diploma.
Employers and job titles
The same split applies to work experience documents. The company name is kept in its registered form, including its legal abbreviation. The job title is translated, because the assessment concerns what you did. Where a Turkish title has no clean counterpart, a description is more useful than a borrowed Canadian title, and the employer letter should describe duties rather than rely on the title alone — see the work experience page.
Consistency across the whole set
Whatever form is chosen must be identical in every document in the file. A university that appears under its Turkish name on the diploma and under a translated name on the transcript looks like two institutions. Keeping one glossary for the whole set, and giving it to whoever translates, prevents an entire category of discrepancy. The checklist page includes this as a final pass.
What we do
When we obtain documents in Türkiye we supply the exact registered names as they appear in the source records, so that whoever prepares the translation is not guessing from a scan. Where an institution has been renamed or merged, we obtain the confirming letter from the registrar rather than leaving the discrepancy for a reviewing officer to discover.
Frequently asked questions
If the institution itself uses an English name officially, it can appear alongside the Turkish name rather than instead of it. Keep both, and use the same pairing in every document, so that a search on either string finds the institution.
A category word within a school name describes the type of school and is usually explained in brackets while the name itself is kept. The point is that a reader understands what kind of institution it was without losing the string that identifies it.
Yes. A diploma records the institution as it was when the qualification was awarded. Do not have the name updated in the translation; obtain a letter from the current institution confirming the succession and submit it with the diploma.
No. The court's name is kept and, at most, its nature is described in brackets. Equating it with a Canadian court asserts a jurisdictional equivalence that is not the translator's to determine.